


Funambulism

by pr0nz69



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Arguing, Childhood Trauma, Delusions, Kissing, M/M, Past Character Death, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Timeskip | Academy Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Spoilers for Pre-Timeskip | Academy Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Teacher-Student Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-04-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:33:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23920876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pr0nz69/pseuds/pr0nz69
Summary: It’s past midnight when Byleth finds Dimitri in the cathedral talking to ghosts.———Dimitri's coming undone. Byleth isn't sure how to help.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/My Unit | Byleth
Comments: 1
Kudos: 76





	Funambulism

**Author's Note:**

> Here's my piece for _My Beloved_ , the Dimileth zine! And you guys get the uncensored version, lucky you! So if you don't like student/teacher, then... don't.. read... it...? ;)

It’s past midnight when Byleth finds Dimitri in the cathedral talking to ghosts.

“Father—I swear it—her head—I’ll—”

He’s never seen him like this before, never seen _anyone_ like this. It isn’t like Mercedes and her ghost stories or Annette and Ashe with their superstitions. It’s the lack of self-awareness, like Dimitri himself doesn’t realize that what he’s doing isn’t normal.

It’s uncanny on its own, his fevered muttering to no one, but after everything that transpired in the Holy Tomb only hours ago, Byleth is disturbed at just how unraveled Dimitri has become.

He steps into a patch of crimson moonlight that sieves over the altar through a panel of stained glass.

“Your father is dead, Dimitri.” He feels like it needs saying.

Dimitri whips around, and the multicolored moonlight glances off his skin, mottled like bruises.

“Professor! What are you—” He stops himself, looking around as if only now becoming aware of his surroundings. “What time is it?”

“After midnight. Dedue was in a panic when he asked me to look for you.”

“Dedue…” Dimitri lifts a hand to his temple, swiping his bloodied cuff across his cheek. “Yes, of course… I…” He breathes in, and the sound is like a puncture site sucking in air.

“You need to get out of those clothes,” Byleth says and then, with a flash of embarrassment that probably doesn’t reach his cheeks: “You’re still covered in blood.”

Dimitri doesn’t appear to notice his gaffe, turning his attention instead to his wrist. “This is… Edelgard’s blood.” His lips crack into something that’s neither a smile nor a grimace.

Byleth shakes his head. “No. It’s her soldiers’. You didn’t engage the Flame Emperor; I did.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” Dimitri snaps, and Byleth steps back, surprised by his sudden aggression. Dimitri’s eyes widen. “Ah—forgive me, Professor! I don’t know what came over me. I’m—I’m just shaken after what…”

Byleth relaxes a little. “I know. I know. It was a shock for everyone. For me. That Edelgard played some part in my father’s death…”

He tenses unconsciously. It still isn’t real, after these few months, after Monica’s—Kronya’s—death, that Father isn’t coming back. That Father is dead.

“Not just Sir Jeralt, Professor—those _monsters_ are responsible for the slaughter that took place in Duscur!” Dimitri’s voice degrades until it’s guttural, bestial, like it was down in the Holy Tomb. Cage the wild boar, Felix had urged.

Byleth gazes at Dimitri now, at the hard lines between his eyes, the heaving of his broad shoulders, the blood on his clothes, and he sees, for the first time, the animal inside the man.

“We shouldn’t jump to conclusions—” he begins, but Dimitri cuts him off.

“Are you doubting me, too, Professor?” In the semidarkness, his eyes are pitted like a cat’s, a lion’s, ferocity jagging the edges of his pupils. “I was there—I know what I saw! Edelgard was there! She—she killed my father! And Stepmother—her own mother! Glenn—and everyone—they all died such senseless, violent deaths! All because of _her_!”

Byleth furrows his brow. “You never mentioned this before the Flame Emperor’s identity was revealed.”

Even now, only months since, he struggles to recall the moment of Father’s death. Of course he remembers Kronya in the guise of Monica. He remembers the Divine Pulse, remembers striking at her with the Sword of the Creator, and then—and then—what? Father died in his arms—Dimitri told him that later—and told him that he cried. But he can’t remember.

And Dimitri was a child at Duscur all those years ago—it isn’t a stretch to suppose that he created false memories for himself, solved a puzzle in his head that never even really existed.

“I blocked it out,” Dimitri mutters, shaking his head. “I blocked it all out. But I remember now. It all makes sense now.”

“Dimitri—”

“Edelgard did it. Edelgard killed them all!”

“ _Dimitri_!”

“Why?” The snarl in his voice tapers to a sob. “Why, El? Why did you do it? Why would you do such a thing? We—we were friends. Weren’t we?”

“Yes,” Byleth says, cautiously. “Yes, you were friends. Think about this, Dimitri. You were a child. _Edelgard_ was a child. That year the two of you spent together, you knew her better than anybody. So tell me about it—and about her.”

If he can get Dimitri to remember Edelgard as she was when he knew her, then perhaps he can pull him back from the brink. He feels—suddenly, acutely—the thin line they’re walking together, the tightrope act that will save or damn them both.

“I already told you,” Dimitri says. “She was in exile with her uncle—”

“Right. But what about Edelgard herself? What was she like?”

Dimitri’s lips twitch, and this time, his smile is gentle and genuine. “She was _wonderful_. Well—she seemed pushy to me at first. But I quickly came to admire her conviction in everything she did. Even at that age.” He laughs a little. “There’s no denying she was brilliant.”

“She taught you how to dance, didn’t she?”

“Yes… Even though I was hopeless at it, she never gave up on me. Once she set her mind on something, she always saw it through to the end.”

“That’s good,” Byleth says, restraining a little sigh of relief. “That’s great. She really cared about you. I can’t imagine she would ever do anything to hurt you—”

“But there was another layer to her,” Dimitri interrupts. “An intense sadness—a darkness—hidden deep under the surface. I couldn’t touch that. No—perhaps I was too afraid to. I didn’t understand that kind of raw emotion back then.”

His smile mutates into a sneer. “Ironic, then, isn’t it, that Edelgard herself would be the one to teach me such utter despair.”

“You’re not thinking clearly,” Byleth interjects, but it’s too late; Dimitri has cycled back to the events of the day already.

“I’ll kill her. I’ll destroy her. I’ll show her the pain that everyone felt when they were massacred by her at Duscur! I’ll make her understand her atrocities, and then—then they’ll be able to rest! And they’ll finally, _finally_ leave me alone!”

“Dimitri!” Byleth cries. “Enough of this! That kind of thinking will lead you to do something rash—”

“ _So what_?” Dimitri rounds on him, his cape cutting through the air like a cleaving blade. “It’s been four years—there’s nothing rash about it! Don’t try to stop me! Would you say the same if you hadn’t had your revenge already?”

Byleth clenches his jaw, biting back the bitterness in his own heart. “I didn’t kill Kronya—and even if I had, her death would have felt just as meaningless. She suffered as she died, just as my father did, and yet still I felt _nothing_ . Because even though she’s dead, even though she got what she deserved, Father isn’t coming back. Father is _never_ coming back. And _your_ father—he will never come back, either.

“I’m sorry, Dimitri,” he adds, quieter now. “But the dead are _dead_. Gone. Nothing we do for their sake in this life will matter to them. Nothing.”

Weight shifts, and the wire beneath their feet creaks. He’s gone too far; if he reaches out, if he tries to steady them now, he’ll lose his balance. Dimitri looks as if he’s been struck, mouth slack, cheeks flushed.

“You’ve been talking to Felix.” An accusation, growled through a thin-lipped sneer.

“I talk to all of my students.”

“You’re on _his_ side, aren’t you?”

“There _aren’t_ any sides. I’m _trying_ to reach you, Dimitri, but”—Byleth shakes his head in frustration—”I’m not good at this. Maybe it sounds like a platitude, but I want what’s best for you. And I can’t stand to see you destroy yourself like this. I may have never known His Majesty, but this can’t be what he wanted for his son. It _can’t_ be.”

He should have suspected, from the moment Dimitri confided in him his true motive for attending Garreg Mach, that all of this ran so much deeper than any of them could see from the surface—a noxious weed whose roots were long left unclipped. He should have suspected, but he has never been good at reading people. As a teacher, surrounded by those who have looked to him for guidance, who have _needed_ him, he has grown cocky in his own abilities— _complacent_. And until now, he had thought, naively, that he had gotten better.

He was wrong.

“How dare you...”

“Dimitri…”

Dimitri howls, cutting to pieces the stillness of the cavernous hall. Byleth feels the hairs on the back of his neck raise, feels fear so primal he almost draws his sword on instinct. He feels, as Dimitri charges toward him, _hunted_.

“How _dare_ you presume to speak for my father?” he screams. He staggers to a stop before reaching Byleth and grabs his own head instead, tearing at his hair with fingers like talons. “How _dare_ you speak for my family? When they are dead and rotting and _haunting_ me, every minute, every day, for _four long years_ ! How _dare_ you?”

It doesn’t escape Byleth’s notice, Dimitri’s aggression suddenly turned inward—self-loathing. He’s suspected it for some time. One misstep on his part spells death. He understands that now. He can’t reach Dimitri anymore—not tonight, not like this.

Maybe not ever.

Dimitri moves to hold himself, arms wrapped around his torso, tight as restraints. His cheeks are wet, glaring in the moonlight.

“I’ll give you space,” Byleth says, numbly. “Please return to your room as soon as possible.” He turns to go.

“No—no, no, _no_ ! _Wait_!”

Byleth jolts when he feels a hand on his wrist, jerking him around with astonishing strength. Another hand curls around the small of his back, pulling him forward, and then lips catch his, Dimitri’s lips, pressing against him with bruising force.

He can’t move. If they weren’t so precarious, he could pull away, twist out of Dimitri’s hold—but not now. If he moves now, he’ll stumble—and Dimitri will fall. Dimitri’s eyes are closed, a moment of respite, and Byleth can only focus on his eyelashes—fine as golden thread, glimmers of light in the dark hollows of his eyes. It’s the only softness left in him, his grip unrelenting on Byleth’s hand, his lips raw as broken glass. The kiss is chaste—maybe not much of a real kiss, Byleth thinks (as if he would know)—yet to allow it to continue, to keep Dimitri dangling over a net knitted from cobwebs—

Yet as wrong as he knows it is, he wants to go further, wants to open his mouth and taste the man before him, his student, his prince—

He wrenches his hand free and lurches back. No. _No_. This is wrong. He wipes his mouth on the back of his glove. Dimitri is distressed. Dimitri doesn’t know what he’s doing. That’s all this is—a moment of vulnerability, a slipping mask. This is his student. This is the crown prince of Faerghus. He has no right to kiss—to love—

Dimitri comes out of it with eyes wide, like he finally feels the vertigo, finally realizes just how far off the ground he truly is. “I-I—”

“It’s alright,” Byleth says, though _what_ is alright, he doesn’t know. The kiss? The night? _What_?

Dimitri touches his mouth with a trembling forefinger. “I’ve got to—I’ve got to go! I-I’m sorry, Professor! I’ll see you in class tomorrow!”

He runs. His legs aren't entirely stable, knees curving in, ankles shaking like a fawn’s, but he runs. Runs for his life.

Byleth doesn’t. The highwire is too thin, too volatile, to step forward or turn back. He’ll wait. He’ll stand here suspended in space, steady as he can, and pray that somewhere along this razor-thin path, Dimitri finds his footing.


End file.
